Relative to its neighbors, the island nation has no history of Islamist terrorism.
Security personnel stand guard at St. Anthony's Church in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on April 24, 2019. By Emily Tamkin Emily Tamkin Reporter covering foreign affairs Email Bio Follow April 24 at 3:19 PM The Easter Sunday attacks in Sri Lanka stunned many, and not only because they marked the worst violence in the country in a decade. Or because the terrorists targeted Christians and foreign tourists, two groups that, for the most part, were spared during Sri Lanka’s three decades of civil war.
And Sri Lanka, relative to its neighbors, did not have a large number of foreign fighters leave the country to join the Islamic State. “The legacy of civil war and insurgency [is] really important when you look at why security forces in Sri Lanka … may have overlooked the threat,” Clarke said. “When you fight a group like the Tamil Tigers for 30 years — the most sophisticated terrorist organization we’ve ever seen before, and I’d include the Islamic State in that — when you fight that kind of a group for 30 years, there’s a residual effect, there’s a lag effect. Ten years later, you’re still pretty much focused on that threat.
“There were worries by diplomats and Muslim leaders I spoke to about Muslims from other countries — [especially] the Maldives — who were thought to have connections with ISIS and were living in Sri Lanka — but they were not thought to pose any threat to Sri Lankans,” Keenan wrote.
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